Your breastfeeding relationship is precious and short. Mindful nursing means connecting with the experience in the moment, bringing your attention back to the milk.
Simple Mindfulness Practice
Mindfulness as a basic meditation practice brings us to a non-judgmental awareness and focus on the moment. That practice can be formal, as we might learn in yoga or in Buddhist meditation, and that practice can be a loose, much less formal yet powerful consciousness in our lives.
A very basic structure for the practice can be:
- sit with your back straight,
- notice your breath, and
- bring your mind back to the breath when it wanders—and it will wander.
You can spend 5 minutes on this practice, 30-minutes, or all day.
Yes, it can be that simple—to start.
Science of Happiness
The science of happiness has begun to tell us that this simple practice of mindfulness or meditation can help us savor the moments and let go of the judgments we let block us.
Our brains reorganize based on our experience. This is called brain plasticity or neuroplasticity. By being present in our moment with kindness and compassion toward ourselves and others, we change our brains. We create pathways ready for peace and happiness.
Just spending those few minutes of breastfeeding in awareness can have a big impact on your life and on your parenting—and through your parenting on your child’s life.
Meditative Breastfeeding
The length of time and the kind of time you spend breastfeeding is a perfect place for mindfulness practice. In most meditation, you bring your attention back to the breath, which you can do while your are nursing a baby, certainly, but there is much in the moment to recognize with breastfeeding. As your mind wanders, you could bring it back to your baby’s breath, to the sound of the suck, to your feeling of letdown, or more generally to the milk. Rather than bringing your mind back to the breath, you can practice bringing your awareness back to the milk.
Practice bringing your awareness back to the milk.
Mindfulness doesn’t push or pull, it recognizes what is as it is. Mindfulness is a practice of compassion, compassion for yourself as you are. At no time in my life have I needed more compassion for myself than in my parenting. Perhaps it is that way for you, too.
Using this breastfeeding time to cultivate a natural awareness will bring you back to yourself as parent, to your baby as a wiggly, giggly new person, and to your relationship with your baby as your milk flows.
Remove Barriers When You Choose
Breastfeeding in a baby carrier or under a cover can leave us disconnected from the experience, from the moment in the experience. It can, but it doesn’t have to if you don’t let these become barriers to your awareness or barriers to your relationship with your baby.
Practice Mindful Milk
However or wherever you are giving your baby milk, be mindful. Bring your awareness back to the physical and the more-than-physical experience.
Whether you breastfeed for months or years, this part of your relationship can feel altogether too short. Being present in the moment, each moment, can help you to welcome the experience as it is and let it change as it must.
As you sit with your baby, let the experience itself bring you back to the moment. Maybe your baby pinches you, bringing you back to the moment. Maybe you gaze into one another’s eyes, bringing you back to the love. Maybe you feel your milk flowing, bringing you back to the milk.
Practice bringing your awareness back to the milk.
For the next month, we are focusing on slowing down, unplugging, and being mindful—of our parenting, of our communities, and of our presence in nature.
Resource
Mindful Parenting. Nancy Bardacke, a midwife who has developed a program for new parents and for those who work with new parents on Mindful-based Childbirth and Parenting. As part of her short talk to other professionals working on Mindful-based Stress Reduction, she shows a video of parents who talk about (and demonstrate) how mindfulness has influenced their parenting.
Photo Breastfeeding – © Cherrymerry | Dreamstime.com
